Page 26 of Veil of Death and Shadow

“Pardon?” The man was watching me now, brows dipped in concern.

“Can I get you some water?” I asked.

He nodded, and I got to work, setting the glass in front of him as I took his order.

Greta was back in the booth with Claudine.

“Thanks for the help,” I whispered to her on my way back behind the counter.

“Once a nurse, always a nurse,” she said, though there was a softness—or sadness—to her expression that hadn’t been there before. Nostalgia, maybe.

I leaned over the counter, my chin resting in my hands as I studied her. She was undoubtedly retired, and I couldn’t imagine her still wanting to work, but someone with a lifetime of nursing skills was beyond useful in these times.

My mind flew to Frank, to the few doctors we had available to us here. “If you’re in town for a bit, you should stop by the medical center a few blocks down, they’re always looking for help. I mean, if you’re interested, of course. No pressure.”

The women shared a look, and Greta nodded, her lips pressed into a grim smile. “Thanks, dear. I’m just passing through, but I’ll look into it if I change my mind.”

“Actually, I think I’m going to head out,” the man said, his words hesitant and expression unreadable. He gave me a slippery grin, one that didn’t reach his eyes. “Forgot I had somewhere to be.”

He collected his things, his gaze shifting from me to the women, confusion etched in the lines between his brows.

“Are you sure? I can get your order to go—” When I reached for a container and turned around, I saw only his back again, as he rushed out the door, his water untouched on the table.

Had the blood made him squeamish?

I’d made sure to wash and sanitize my hands before serving him.

Claudine winced at the sound of the door clanging shut. Her lips pressed into a thin smile as some unreadable conversation passed between the women. She let out a harsh laugh, before turning back to me. “Well, that was rude. But enough about him. Tell me, how are you today, dear? Any new developments to report? Have you started the journaling practice, like we discussed last week?”

I had lessthan an hour before I needed to get back to the diner for the dinner service, which meant that I had just enough time to sneak in a quick visit to Frank.

Sora and I did our best to make the trip every day, trading off when the other had a shift in the diner.

The walk to the medical center—a refurbished hospice with outdated supplies and tech that only occasionally worked—was quiet.

I leaned my head back, soaking in the feel of the sun against my skin. It was hot, and living without air conditioning was becoming more and more difficult each summer, especially now that I spent a good portion of my day in the relentless heat of a kitchen. Maybe one day, I’d get used to my skin feeling constantly sticky, but all I wanted right now was to go for a solid swim.

Maybe I could convince Sora to postpone our night out long enough for a quick dip in the lake before sunset.

“Mareena.” A soft voice pulled me from my reverie.

“Hey, Jo. How’s your mom today?”

Jo scooped her long, thick braids, holding them off her neck in a makeshift ponytail as the sun drew beads of sweat along her skin. She shrugged; her smile full of warmth even as some of it faded from her eyes. “No change, you know how it is.”

I did.

Jo spent most of her afternoons working in the med center. That’s where I’d met her, though she’d since become a frequent visitor at the diner whenever she could be convinced to get some fresh air and a hot meal, which wasn’t as often as Sora and I would have liked.

Like most of us, Jo’s plans have radically shifted in the last few years. Before The Undoing, she had an ambitious and rigorous life laid out before her. She’d been admitted to a competitive anthropology program down south and had every intention of seeking a prestigious fellowship after completing her doctoral program.

When her mother and sister got sick, she tossed those plans, abandoned her dissertation, and pivoted to learning as much as she could about medicine. “Research was research,” as she often said, and her skillset made the pivot with remarkable ease. It had been too late to save her sister, but she still clung to the possibility that she might find a way to help her mother.

Without money or influence, though, the options most of us had were slim.

The community kept the medical center up and running, and we had volunteers—one former med student, a doula, a seamstress, and Jo. It was more than a lot of the humans living outside of the compounds had, though our access to any state-of-the-art medicine was nothing compared to what it had been in the Before.

Occasionally, if Jo submitted her research to the closest compound specializing in healing—the one run by the Sect of Azrael—along with some patient blood samples, they’d send back enough to update a piece of equipment or add an extra bed or two. It was their attempt at ensuring our compliance and goodwill, while they benefited from the fruits of Jo and the other volunteers’ meticulous labor. Jo would do the work, and their patients would be the ones to survive because of it. Hers were collateral damage, cheap test subjects along the way.

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